


Gold in Torchlight

by RedEris



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-09-02
Packaged: 2018-04-18 17:06:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4713782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedEris/pseuds/RedEris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Samhal Lavellan, main character of my story Little Fox, demonstrates one of the skills he picked up before becoming Herald, and dances for the companions.  This is literally just a bellydancing scene I got the urge to write.  The song Samhal is dancing to can be listened to here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeaajoNAx-A</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gold in Torchlight

The torches lit the little wooden stage dimly and flickered over the form there, kneeling and bowed forward, arms outstretched along the worn rug. In the darkness behind, a drum began a light, steady beat, the empty spaces of the rhythm filled with the patter of quick fingers against the ramskin. On the second iteration of the rhythm, a deeper drum came in, and Samhal began slowly to rise, leading with his shoulders as his head hung. As he moved, the torches caught the sheen of gold powder over skin and muscle. Fine gold chains shifted and glinted over his forearms.

A lone bagpipe began to lay down a low, haunting melody as Samhal’s body twisted to the side, shoulder skimming over the floor first to one side and then the other before twisting until he stretched backwards, nearly horizontal from knee to chin, hair not quite brushing the floor beneath him. A second bagpipe joined the first. His hands moved sinuously, almost lazily from stomach to chest, fluttering like birds above his neck before climbing in a series of sinuous twists, pulling him up behind them shoulders first. He rose from the floor as if drawn by an invisible rope, stomach muscles taut with the effort. At last he stood upright and contemplated his audience for a moment with a smile equal parts seduction and arrogance.

Samhal’s left hand snaked out, third finger pressed delicately to his thumb, and the fire caught on gold rings and gold cuffs. The bass drum spoke again with its insistent triple thump, and the motion of the hand rippled up Samhal’s arm, through one shoulder and then the other, down to the right hand and back up, but this time the motion snaked down his chest and over his abdomen, ending in a series of smooth twists of his hips that set the gold-shot blue silk of his billowing pants rippling. A quick flick of one bare foot began the mincing steps of a turn, muscles sliding over each other, each moment both tightly controlled and seemingly effortless. When his back was to his audience he began to bend backwards, arms moving as though lowering him down that invisible rope, until his shoulders were parallel to the ground, his body bowed so that his face tipped back to the watchers. White teeth flashed against dark skin.

Suddenly the lead drum let out a quick flurry of beats and the rhythm picked up. Samhal’s eyes glittered as he righted himself and twirled, hip following foot in a quick circle, arms thrown out and shoulders squared. First shoulders, then stomach, then hips moved, each eerily independent of the others. His chest rose and fell sharply with the drums before the motion flowed down to the enameled buckle that held a glittering confection of gold chains around his waist. Samhal’s fluid hips dragged the buckle around in quicker and quicker figure-eights until one grew into a twist and then a spin. His arms rose and framed him as he spun more and more quickly, feet pattering with the pattering of the lead drum, pants flaring out, skin shimmering, open hands pulling his audience to the brink of excitement, their pulses pounding with the beat.

The end came all at once. Instead of marking the axis on which he twirled, Samhal’s head dipped to the side. One foot left the neat orbit it had been following to flash up into the air, followed rapidly by the other as he flung himself through a handless cartwheel and landed precisely in the spot he had just left, freezing just on the last beat of the drums.  
For a moment, the companions were frozen as well, still held in the dance’s spell. Then Samhal cocked out a hip and broke into a broad grin.

“See now, none of this limp-dick Orlesian bullshit—that’s how it’s done.”


End file.
